An incandescent bulb, including a wire filament encased in glass, may emit only about 5% of the energy it consumes as light, with the remaining 95% percent of the energy being wasted as heat. Fluorescent lights may be approximately 4 times more efficient than incandescent bulbs, but may include toxic materials such as mercury vapor. Light emitting diodes may generate light as efficiently as fluorescent lights without the toxic mercury vapor. Light emitting diodes are thus being developed for lighting applications to replace incandescent bulbs and fluorescent lights as discussed, for example, in the article entitled “An Even Brighter Idea” from The Economist Print Edition, Sep. 21, 2006.
U.S. Patent Publication No. 2006/0056169 entitled “Light Module Using LED Clusters” (the '169 publication), for example, discusses a streetlight wherein the conventional incandescent light bulb is replaced by sets of light-emitting LED clusters. In the '169 publication, light emitting diodes are mounted in a downward direction in a manner to disperse light directly onto the intended area of the road or street surface.
Notwithstanding known uses of light emitting diodes to provide lighting, there continues to exist a need in the art for lighting systems providing improved efficiency, brightness, illumination pattern, and/or light color.